Ah, the simple things in life

So after my huge success with replacing a headlamp bulb (any success is a win, right?) I moved onto something which is kind of cosmetic but has been annoying me, the roof rails.
There is a clear gap on the centre and rear mounts both sides between the mounts and the roof which the garage that sold me the car were unable to sort out. Having managed to carefully remove the rails I can now see the problem and it means I have to treat every part on the car as suspect

This unsovable issue was because most of the fitting kit was absent and what screws there were holding the rails in place were as tight as possible but the missing parts meant the rails would never sit flush.
The rails were missing all the mounting gaskets so that the rails mounted metal to the roof, neither centre mount had a screw (in part because one had sheared so a threaded portion was left in place) and somehow the n/s rail was 3mm too long for the mounting point so they had angled the bolt to fit it, cross-threading it.
I nearly forgot, as a final thrust, the near side rear mount cover was not snapping into place so they used a self-tapping screw to hold it down.

I now have to decide if it is worth trying to find a full fitting kit and re-use the rails or if I get a complete new rail set plus matching fitting kit or just get the blanking plugs and bin the rails....oh how easily the bubble of joy bursts

I recommend avoiding the person that fitted them and if you can name them we can avoid as well.

Sadly I don't know who did the original fitting although I do know who failed to notice some rather obvious missing parts. Their main stock in trade appears to be buying vehicles from Insurance auctions and tidying them up for resale so I am fairly sure they are not anyone on the forum would be using for any work. Especially when there are at least 4 LR-specific workshops (albeit small ones) in the area who all seem to have a good rep.
My reason for using them was that the price was seriously good even after adding the cost of a full AA check to make sure it was safe to drive away.

Leomas said:

This unsovable issue was because most of the fitting kit was absent and what screws there were holding the rails in place were as tight as possible but the missing parts meant the rails would never sit flush.
The rails were missing all the mounting gaskets so that the rails mounted metal to the roof, neither centre mount had a screw (in part because one had sheared so a threaded portion was left in place) and somehow the n/s rail was 3mm too long for the mounting point so they had angled the bolt to fit it, cross-threading it.
I nearly forgot, as a final thrust, the near side rear mount cover was not snapping into place so they used a self-tapping screw to hold it down.

Click to expand...

wow, what a butcher!